SOCIAL AND DIPLOMATIC MEMORIES, 1902-1919
BY THE RIGHT HON.SIR JAMES RENNELL RODD, G.C.B.

CHAPTER VIII
1889-1914

Antecedents of the Great War.
Retrospect over relations between Great Britain and Germany from
1889. The part played by the Emperor. Estimate of the measure
of his responsibility.

As the record of these memories approaches the outbreak of
the war it seems opportune to review the evolution of our relations
with the German Empire in the light of the appreciations formed
during my diplomatic career from personal observation and acquaintance
with many of those directly concerned in their shaping.

I have mentioned elsewhere the advice given by Bismarck to
his successor, Count Caprivi, to play with political combinations
as a juggler plays with balls and always to keep the game going.
Such advice could only be successfully followed by a manipulator
as skilful and experienced as himself. The successors of Bismarck
were less adroit jugglers and the trick became more easy to detect.
But it continued for awhile to take in others as well as ourselves.
Sir Edward Malet's letters to me from the Embassy at Berlin, after
I had left, indicated that during the first few years of the reign
of William II there was a real endeavour to keep well with us.
The negotiation of the Agreement of 1890, which entailed the cession
of Heligoland but revindicated and obtained recognition for our
claims to an heritage in East Africa which had almost been allowed
to lapse, should have cleared the horizon. Officially at any rate
friendly relations subsisted while a Conservative Government at
home remained in office. And yet that growing sentiment of antagonism
towards Great Britain, to which I have referred in earlier chapters
as obsessing public opinion in Germany, was not diminished, and
soon after Bismarck's fall the Ambassador was aware of an appreciable
change in the atmosphere. After having to all appearances enjoyed
complete confidence in the highest quarters over a number of years
he himself became conscious of some occult influence working against
him. The Emperor appeared more disposed to make confidences to
the military attaché. There was growing reason to suspect
a deliberate attempt to embroil us with France, any renewal of
cordiality with whom on our part would have been most unwelcome
to ambitions which could not be realized until the French danger
had been eliminated. So long as we remained completely independent
of any European grouping there was a doubt which way our influence
might gravitate at a critical moment. The object of German policy
appeared at that time to be to draw us into the Triple Alliance
by action calculated to remind us unpleasantly that isolation
was disadvantageous to our interests and might even become dangerous.
German psychology was then, as not infrequently since, at fault.
Its failure to achieve the desired result increased irritation,
and a critical situation arose in our relations in 1895 when the
Jameson Raid offered the Emperor and his advisers an unanticipated
opportunity to display what they regarded as the strength of their
hand.

Apart from the immediate object in view there were other ulterior
designs already occupying the minds of the more ambitious among
the moving spirits in Germany. The comparative ease with which
the empire had been enabled to acquire an extensive overseas dominion
and experience in handling colonial questions with us had no doubt
suggested that we offered the line of least resistance to their
expansionist ideals. It was found remunerative to represent Great
Britain as unaccommodating and to protest a grievance. We undoubtedly
controlled a large proportion of the world's markets, and advantage
might be taken of our self-complacent lack of vigilance. A systematic
investigation of the weak points in our armour in the East by
agents whose activities could readily be disavowed was in process.
I came across evidence of the existence of such an organization
during my residence in Egypt. Far-reaching schemes of world-wide
extension cherished aims which were not for immediate realization,
and gave veiled encouragement to instruments which might become
useful hereafter. In due course our monopolies would be challenged,
and our commercial establishment would be undermined. There was,
however, I feel convinced, in those early days little anticipation
of possible hostilities with Great Britain. Baron Marschall von
Bieberstein, very soon after he became Minister for Foreign Affairs,
genially observed to a member of our Embassy at Berlin---I do
not claim to quote the exact words he used---" The nails
in the coffin of British commercial supremacy have already been
hammered by your Trade Unions. They will not allow the people
to work for more than a limited time, and that means the end of
your trade. We shall study everything that you make and that you
require, and by supplying it on cheaper terms we shall ruin you.
We can get all we want without fighting, thanks to your Trade
Unions."

In the first volume of these recollections I traced the initial
stages and earlier phases of the process which led to the alienation
of British goodwill from Germany after a series of ungracious
proceedings on her part which in course of time almost assumed
the character of unfriendly acts. This attitude, originally no
doubt adopted in order to convince us of the errors of our isolation,
and the necessity of drawing closer to Germany, became an unfortunate
habit. In the meantime publicists and lecturers like Treitschke
continued to impress upon their audiences that Great Britain was
a piratical State, unjustly enjoying by past violence and permanent
cunning a place of vantage to which superior merit entitled the
German race.

How successfully the process of suggestion had worked is confirmed
by a passage in a secret memorandum written by Bülow in November
1899, during his visit to England with the Emperor. He says that
it is certain that opinion in England is far less anti-German
than opinion in Germany is anti-British, and he indicated the
dangerous character of such correspondents of The Times as
Chirol and Saunders, who knew from observation the depth and bitterness
of German antipathy. [Third series of official documents from
archives of German Foreign Office published after the war.]

So confirmed had this vicious habit of mind become in the early
years of this century that I was hardly surprised, shortly after
Bülow became Chancellor, to find that one of the oldest members
of the Reichstag, who still believed in the advantage to Germany
of good relations with ourselves, could express himself in the
following terms : "Ich fürchte dass Bülow wird
nur regieren können, wenn er immer von Zeit zu Zeit ein Tröpfchen
Giftgegen England ausschenkt." (" Iam
afraid Bülow will only be able to govern if he continues
from time to time to distil a little drop of poison against England.")
It was the progressive intensification of this attitude, confirmed
by other indications of growing antagonism, together with the
repudiation of advances made by us in a spirit of conciliation
---one of the drops of poison which the Chancellor had occasion
to distil---combined with a naval programme obviously directed
against ourselves, which had for their inevitable consequence
the abandonment of our position of isolation in Europe, not in
the direction to which Germany had hoped at one time to force
us, but in favour of an entente with France and eventually
also of an understanding with Russia.

This modification of the European situation for which the statesmanship
of the German Empire, supported by the dominant classes and emphasized
by an organized Press, was directly responsible, had then to be
explained to a public to whom the new grouping of Powers was most
unwelcome, and for this purpose the charge of an Einkreisungs-Politik
(Policyof encirclement) by Great Britain was invented.
As Treitschke had employed the instrument of suggestion to establish
that Great Britain was the essential enemy, a contention which
gradually obtained a strong hold upon opinion in Germany, so now
a similar process of suggestion was used to convince the nation
that there had been a deliberate and successful effort, in which
King Edward was indicated as the prime mover, promoted by the
British Government and seconded by the British people, to encircle
Germany and thwart her legitimate expansion.

Now what were the real facts? Germany was, it is true, more
or less ringed round by hostile elements. But such a situation
had existed long before any suggestion of action on our part was
mooted, and while Great Britain and the Empire were on the best
of terms. Already while I was still posted at Berlin, and before
the year 1888, Bismarck had lamented in conversation with Malet
that Germany should be surrounded by enemies and doubtful friends,
and that her geographical and moral position made it therefore
necessary for her to maintain an iron system of caste. But who
was to blame for her unfortunate position ? Of her immediate neighbours
Denmark had been ruthlessly despoiled by Prussia. France had been
rendered irreconcilable by the terms imposed after the war of
1870. Dismembered Poland---and Prussia had very materially contributed
to that dismemberment---was kept chronically discontented by the
administrative measures enforced in the Prussian provinces. And
Russia, which it had been Bismarck's policy for so many years
to conciliate, was thrown over when he had to choose between her
and Austria-Hungary, and decided that close alliance with the
dual monarchy was the more important interest to Germany. [The
breach was emphasized when in 1890 Caprivi, acting under the Emperor's
instructions, failed to renew Bismarck's reinsurance treaty with
Russia.] It is hardly necessary to seek to identify the doubtful
friends, among whom Belgium may have been included by those whose
plan for the invasion of France contemplated the violation of
a neutrality which they had guaranteed. As the occupation of the
Netherlands had also figured in Schlieffen's plan of campaign,
it is possible that by an inversion of ideas, which finds its
analogy in the fable of the Wolf and the Lamb, the friendship
of Holland might also be regarded as precarious. When finally
the goodwill of Great Britain, with whom the states which became
the German Empire had been at peace for a century, was gratuitously
alienated, it was found necessary to hypnotize the German people
into believing that the unaccountable hostility of almost every
neighbour must be some one else's fault, and "England"
was made responsible. It must, however, be obvious to all who
did not lend themselves to a process of suggestion which assisted
the passage of the Navy Bill, that this encircling of Germany
was an established fact for a quarter of a century before Great
Britain, driven thereto by an aggressive spirit of unfriendliness
on her part, abandoned her position of isolation in Europe.

That the deliberate policy of Great Britain had brought about
the hostile encirclement of Germany was no doubt honestly believed
by the majority of the German people, and the prevalence of that
conviction may to some extent account for the violent demonstrations
of feeling against our country which took concrete form in hymns
of hate and other popular manifestations on the outbreak of war.
The average German of the masses as I have known him is generally
a good-hearted fellow, law-abiding, methodical and contented with
his lot, but rather lacking in initiative, and therefore readily
amenable to suggestion from those whose judgment he has been trained
to respect. If, as I believe, an encirclement of Germany, so far
as it really existed, was due to circumstances with which we had
nothing to do, responsibility for the general acceptance of this
historic fiction must lie with those who saw their advantage in
inspiring it.

An unreflecting conversational and journalistic habit of language
is apt to attribute intentions and activities to rival nations
in general terms as if the collectivity of any nation were inspired
by a single intelligence, whereas it is very difficult in most
countries to form an opinion as to who is really pulling the strings
and determining a course of action, how far in fact the governing
element is following and how far it is directing public opinion.
It was perhaps less difficult in the Germany of thirty years ago,
when a current inimical to Great Britain began to manifest itself.
The machinery of State was still retained in few hands, and the
masses, in spite of a highly developed standard of popular education,
still moved on the old traditional lines of disciplined obedience
to a dominant class. The Socialist party was indeed gathering
strength, and promised to become a formidable political factor.
But their Socialism had an essentially German character, admittedly
claiming far more than it hoped to achieve, and not insensible,
as events proved, to the advantages of "Deutschland über
Alles." The learned, scientific and literary classes,
from whom independence would in other countries be anticipated,
were all associated with the elaborate machine of State, which
controlled appointments and promotion. With rare exceptions they
therefore readily accepted the general direction given by authority,
and saw their own interest in promoting the efficiency of the
machine. At the head of the State and of the national forces were
men who had been brought up in the Bismarckian tradition, which
recognized no other criterion but success, and who realized that,
however questionable might have been the means by which success
was secured, the memory of these fell quickly into the second
plane, when once an accomplished fact had been generally accepted.
Bismarck himself disappeared, but the mentality which he had created
remained, and the lesser men who took his place, satellites of
a very different sun, a group instead of the single dominant personality
who had brought about the union of Germany, now conceived a vaster
extension of dominion and a welding of the whole nation into an
irresistible machine for its accomplishment. The danger to the
world became more acute, because once the madness of unrestrained
racial aspirations has established itself, men are apt to lose
all sense of moral and ethical values.

To such aims the more immediate and obvious obstacles had first
to be removed. The more remote, the sea-power of Great Britain,
with her widely extended nexus of dominions and dependencies,
could wait. Internal disintegration would prepare the way meanwhile.
How often had I encountered in conversation with Germans about
the world expressions of an ostensibly benevolent but perceptibly
ironical regret at the impending wane of British ascendancy, undermined
by prosperity and disregard for the proper duties of the citizen!
The conviction, however, that the issue with France had not been
finally settled in 1871was established in the mind of
every German of the governing class almost immediately after the
peace. That France should have remained unreconciled to the loss
of Alsace-Lorraine was referred to as constituting a perpetual
menace which it was essential to the national welfare to dispose
of once and for all. Several times the issue had seemed about
to be put to the test. The first attempt, as long ago as 1875,
encountered an opposition in other countries which the prudence
of the old Chancellor was bound to respect. Then there was the
much-discussed Schnaebele incident, insignificant in itself, which
almost led to mobilization. The Boulanger manifestations were
carefully watched, and there was the closing of the Alsatian frontier
in 1887. All these incidents occurred under the Bismarckian régime.
The Chancellor, when he had to make his choice in favour of Austria-Hungary
and the Triple Alliance, and to renounce a long-established policy
of courting Russia, recognized that Germany would one day have
to fight simultaneously on her eastern and western frontiers,
a task which would become far more formidable if British naval
co-operation could not be definitely excluded. There was, however,
in any case much to do before such a prospect could be faced with
equanimity. Strategic railways had to be completed, and reserves
to be accumulated after a new army bill had been forced through
a reluctant Reichstag. He was therefore probably speaking the
truth when he used the words which I have quoted elsewhere, [vol.
I, p. 56.] and said that he himself desired to wage no more wars.
For the moment it seemed preferable to encourage France to spend
her energies in vast colonial schemes, and by occasional discreet
support to divert her ill-will and direct it into a new channel
against Great Britain, with whom such enterprises were sure to
bring her into conflict. Thus the action which to the older generation
meant the security of the Empire, but which the younger regarded
as an inevitable prelude to yet vaster schemes of world dominion
was deferred, and France was humoured in Egypt and West Africa
at our expense. Meanwhile, the antagonism to Great Britain, fostered
over a number of years, prepared the German public for increases
to a navy which would provide a fleet sufficiently strong to make
the Baltic safe, and give a third party reason to reflect before
intervening when the moment should arrive to try conclusions with
France. There was, however, some lack of consistency in this intermediary
period when the hope was still entertained of attracting us towards
the Triple Alliance. An attitude often provocative was tempered
by an apparent anxiety not to go too far. Events also are apt
to anticipate the best-laid plans for controlling them and, notwithstanding
that the Minister for Foreign Affairs at Berlin had declared the
independence of the South African Republic to be a German interest,
and that many other significant hints had been given of the possibility
of German intervention, we succeeded, after sacrifices which were
certainly not diminished by such encouragement, in consolidating
our position on the ocean highroad to the Far East. Germany found
compensation in concessions and extension of influence in the
Near East. But her attitude during the South African War had been
a revelation to many of our countrymen, and it prepared the way
for the entente with France.

At this time the sinister personality of Baron Holstein had
begun to make itself strongly felt in the German Foreign Office,
though his attempt to force our hands after the Jameson Raid by
a continental coalition against Great Britain had met with no
encouragement in France. Some twenty years earlier he had himself
told me that in the State service he had ceased to be a human
being. Certainly in his case increasing age which generally brings
tolerance---he was over seventy---had in no way softened the violence
of his prejudices and antipathies. The creature of Bismarck, who
had employed him to watch and report upon his rival, Arnim, it
was perhaps not surprising that he should have been credited with
encouraging a system of espionage, and with receiving communications
regarding their chiefs from subordinates in missions abroad. He
deserted the old Chancellor in the crisis of his difference with
the Emperor, and, having established a claim to consideration
under the new order, began to spin webs of his own. The failure
of Russia in the Japanese War, the exhaustion of material, and
the practical destruction of her navy, followed by revolutionary
movements in the country, no doubt suggested to him that the moment
was ripe for the resumption of a more aggressive attitude towards
France. In any case under his pressure the Moroccan bombshell
was launched. The action of Germany on this occasion could not
appear other than provocative, inasmuch as M. Rouvier had already
offered her all that she could reasonably claim for the advancement
of her interests. It is curious that a man so out of touch with
the world as Holstein, whose horizon was confined to his desk,
should have acquired such a dominant position. But his influence,
expressed in words quoted to me for which I cannot of course vouch,
"Wirmüssen Frankreich erst demüthigen
" (wemust first humiliate France), was allowed
to prevail with the Chancellor. The Algeciras Conference, which
was the result of her insistence, was however rather a humiliation
for Germany, who had to retreat from the position she had truculently
assumed. An old friend who had spent most of his life at the Prussian
Court told me that William II did not enter very willingly into
the Morocco adventure, and this was probably true, as at that
time the German artillery was in process of modification, and
the military authorities would hardly have chosen such a moment
for war. In any case he realized that the action taken had completely
isolated Germany. This is clearly demonstrated by the diary of
his aide-de-camp, Count von Dohna Schlobitten, who was afterwards
military attaché at St. Petersburg, where his papers passed
during the war into the hands of the Secret Police and were discovered
after the revolution by the provisional Government. The observations
which the Emperor made to him on the unfortunate Morocco incident
are fully recorded. It was especially the attitude of Italy at
Algeciras which roused his ire, and he is reported to have said
that it was only then, in 1906, that he had knowledge of the understanding
by which Italy had some years before given France a free hand
in Morocco in return for her recognition of Italy's reversionary
claims in Tripoli. I have too sincere a regard for the King of
Italy to permit myself to quote the extraordinarily offensive
language which the Emperor is textually reported in the diary
to have used in speaking of His Majesty. If this understanding
was not suspected and reported on by German representatives in
1902, it is the more interesting to myself to learn that Prinetti
should at that time have allowed me to extract Information from
him which was withheld from Italy's ally.

North-west Africa was destined once more to reveal the miscalculations
of German diplomacy in inexperienced hands in 1911, when the cruiser
Panther was suddenly ordered to Agadir with the results,
so far as our relations were concerned, referred to in a previous
chapter.

A meeting of King Edward with M. Delcassé at Paris,
after the first German demonstration in Morocco, had also occasioned
considerable preoccupation at Berlin, and for the moment, to the
disgust of Holstein, a retreat all along the line was inevitable.
In the instance under review the Emperor seems to have applied
the drag to his Ministers, foreseeing the danger of being forced
to take action when the isolation of Germany was manifest. The
first step towards the realization of her ambitions was once more
postponed. Meanwhile, the preparatory process of peaceful penetration
by a controlling influence over the financial and economic systems
of other countries was adroitly prosecuted by agencies ostensibly
independent, but subsidiary in various degrees to the vast machine
of State, for which the whole nation, trained to confidence in
its destiny and infatuated with the dream of world dominion, worked
with one heart and mind. It was not until we were involved in
the Great War that we fully realized the disadvantages of having
allowed the control of the world's market in wolfram and zinc
concentrates, mostly derived from British dominions, to pass almost
entirely into the hands of far-seeing Germans.

At this stage, after the British rapprochement with
France and Russia, the failure of the Morocco policy and the clear
indication that Italy, though a member of the Triple Alliance,
would maintain her own liberty of judgment and action in questions
not contemplated by its terms, Germany saw her advantage in standing
aside for a time and watching events, while Austria-Hungary was
allowed to take the lead in a policy which inevitably compromised
her relations with Russia. A certain number of years would still
have to pass before the latter could construct the contemplated
strategic railways which would enable her to utilize her vast
military potentiality to dangerous advantage in a European conflict,
and the administrative defects in her military organization were
no secret to a vigilant neighbour. On the other hand, internal
conditions in the Austrian Empire, a maturing national conscience
among the various elements of which it was composed and the growing
menace of disintegration had reached a danger point for which
the men at the head of affairs saw no remedy but war. The Austro-Hungarian
Ambassador in Rome, discussing these matters about a year before
war broke out with a friend of mine belonging to a nation which
the central Empires then regarded practically as an ally, had
observed: "If we can have a war within two years I think
we may still save the Empire." We were to read later in the
German Crown Prince's memoirs that when the moment for decision
came Germany was dragged at the heels of Austria. It was no doubt
convenient that circumstances should give colour to such a contention.
But Germany was never in recent years "dragged" where
she was not prepared to go. Even those who are disposed to take
the most indulgent view of the German attitude on the eve of the
Great War admit that she allowed the decrepit Empire of the Habsburgs
to gamble with her vast resources. The historical antecedents
of Prussia make it obvious that she would never have done so if
those who controlled the situation had not been convinced that
the result would turn out to their ultimate advantage. If the
moment seemed opportune for the realization of long-cherished
aims, as it did when circumstances pointed to the elimination
of Great Britain from the struggle, it was all to the good that
the initiative should appear to the rest of the world to have
been taken by Austria.

The last phase as I saw it develop will be dealt with in an
ensuing chapter. Here I have only endeavoured to recapitulate
from my notes and diaries the premonitory symptoms as they manifested
themselves to an observer with some experience in watching foreign
affairs, whose diagnosis of them may or may not be the correct
one which history will eventually sanction. It is only by the
correlation of a number of such opinions recorded in good faith
by contemporaries that future historians, seeing the proportion
of things more justly from a certain distance, will pronounce
the final verdict. Those in Germany itself who adhered to moderate
views and aims will regard my summary as overdrawn. I have carefully
considered all that I have written in these pages, and conclude
like Luther, "God help me, I can no other."

How far the acute danger of the situation prevailing in Europe
during the last decade before the war was appreciated by my countrymen
I was less well able to judge in my position abroad, from which
I only returned for relatively brief periods of leave. Among those
of whom I saw most I did not detect any exceptional preoccupation,
and the optimism or indifference prevailing among our own people
was an additional source of anxiety. My wife, who has always been
interested in investigating special lines of activity open to
women, had discussed with me the idea of a woman's movement for
promoting local and village granaries, which would enable the
population of the British Isles to be ensured of a grain supply
for at least six months. The difficulties were obvious, and if
I refer to the question here it is only to illustrate what we
had in our minds. She also put forward, in a letter to the Spectator,
a suggestion for the maintenance on our common lands of pigs,
which would contribute to the local food supply in case of shortage
at a critical time. We were the objects of a little genial banter
from our friends on account of our alarmist apprehensions, and
the majority appeared to consider that any restriction of the
food supply of the nation was a proposition too fantastic to be
seriously considered.

There should, however, have been no illusions on the part of
responsible statesmen who had had access to reports from our representatives
and the military and naval attachés abroad over a number
of years. Though it became the fashion when war broke out to attack
our diplomatists, I do not doubt that their correspondence which,
with perhaps one exception, rarely erred on the side of optimism
with regard to relations with Germany, will. be found to be illuminating
when examined by future historians. The capital levy of fifty
million pounds for military purposes passed by the Reichstag in
1913 was a warning danger signal. In view of the attempts which
were made to discover whether some modus vivendi might
not be possible, it would seem that the approaching menace was
better appreciated than the occasional reassuring utterances of
politicians appeared to admit. With such inquiries, however, I
had nothing to do, and I have therefore no comments to make upon
them.

Since the war a number of the principal actors on the stage
have published records of their experiences and activities. Hindenburg,
Ludendorff and Tirpitz have told their story from the German point
of view, and Bethmann Hollweg's career as Chancellor has been
illustrated by the pen of a successor in that office. Count Zedlitz-Trützschler
has given a grim picture of the inner life of the imperial court.
Baron von Eckhardstein has dealt with the period antecedent to
the war. Documents of considerable interest to the student and
never meant for publication, such as the Diary of Count Dohna
referred to above and the ex-Emperor's marginal notes on telegrams
and despatches have become public property. The memoirs of Count
Tchernin and the confessions of Conrad von Hoetzendorff have thrown
light on the attitude of Austria-Hungary. There is, moreover,
no lack of first-hand evidence available regarding the situation
in Russia. Future historians, who will have only a superabundance
of evidence from which to assign responsibilities, will probably
attach relatively little importance to the apologia of William
II, which betrays a singular incapacity for seeing things in their
true light, and a power of self-deception so remarkable as to
deprive the volume of importance as an historic document.

It may, however, be of interest, and it seems just, in view
of the universal and at a certain moment almost hysterical denunciations
of this unhappy man in allied countries, to endeavour to estimate
retrospectively the real influence which he may have exercised
in bringing about the cataclysm for which he has been made responsible.
For this purpose it is necessary to consider such antecedents
and indications of character as were available to an observer
endeavouring to estimate them without prejudice and with due allowance
for the disabilities as well as the opportunities of an exceptional
position. I have in the first volume of these memories recorded
certain experiences of early personal relations which illustrated
a want of consistency in a very minor matter, though one of considerable
importance to myself. A personal letter from the Emperor Frederick
to Bismarck, which the latter unscrupulously and vindictively
made public in the third volume of his memoirs, suggesting that
his son had an overweening estimate of himself, was there referred
to. Such testimony from one who would naturally be disposed to
indulgence is significant, and indicates that the relations between
parents and son were not always harmonious. Indeed, as the heir-presumptive
when I knew him in Berlin, Prince Wilhelm always betrayed constraint
in their presence. Their standards were perhaps exacting. They
certainly differed very materially from those which he found in
fashion at the university, and in the regiment to which he was
appointed, where the Bismarckian spirit was rampant. Opposition
probably accentuated his early disposition for ascendancy. Prince
Wilhelm and his mother were temperamentally too much alike ever
to get on. She was an idealist, and lacking in a certain worldly
wisdom. He was also an idealist, but his idealism moved on other
lines, and was vitiated by a self-assurance which seldom allowed
him to question the soundness of his own conclusions. He was,
however, in certain respects naive, not lacking the quality which
the French attribute to the bon enfant, and he could show
much kindliness of heart towards those to whom he was attached.
Malet, who saw him very frequently after his accession, believed
him to be honest in principle regarding what he felt to be right
and wrong. At the same time he considered him very impetuous and
inordinately vain of his position. He was versatile and clever,
which is a very different thing from being wise, and his undisputed
charm of address was enhanced by his position of ascendancy. He
appeared to be fully conscious of this influence, and he exercised
it with an assumption of frankness which did not prevent him from
using quite contradictory language to different persons of different
nationalities. He had the misfortune to succeed to the throne
prematurely. He was only twenty-eight, and the circumstances of
his youth, combined with a very early marriage, had not afforded
him much opportunity for the independent schooling which forms
a cautious man of the world. The life of a courtier at Berlin
was a profession rather than an honorary service, and with rare
exceptions he was after his accession surrounded only by sycophants
competing for royal favour and dependent on himself for place
and promotion. Once he had dropped the old pilot it is probable
that for many years there was no one at hand who ventured to tell
him home truths, and while an obsequious deference from men of
proved experience conduced to the growth of absolutism, an universal
atmosphere of flattery stimulated the Emperor's unhealthy vanity
to a belief in his own infallibility.

William II had a religious strain in his constitution. Looking
back to the days when I used to meet him and heard much at first
hand of the opinions which he expressed to his intimates, I can
believe that through many years of his reign he felt very gravely
the responsibility which must rest on those who draw the sword,
and that he had personally resolved if possible to avoid war and
satisfy his vast ambition for the supremacy of his country by
its economic and industrial development. He was, however, persuaded
that peace, under which these aims might be realized, would be
best secured by military supremacy. It is interesting to remember
that for a certain time he was considerably influenced by General
von Waldersee, who presented a typical example of the not uncommon
association of the military spirit with strong evangelical convictions.
When he succeeded after his father's brief and tragic reign, Germany
had by far the strongest military organization in Europe. He lost
no opportunity of further advancing her military strength and
readiness for any eventuality. He was thoroughly infected with
the martial spirit and acquainted with every detail of his army.
Experienced soldiers resented his incompetent intervention at
manoeuvres, to which they nevertheless submitted without protest.
His self-conceit betrayed itself in the obvious enjoyment with
which he referred to himself as the Supreme War Lord and the Admiral
of the Atlantic. The histrionic quality of his flamboyant speeches
gave them a provocative character, the effect of which he may
not perhaps himself have measured. He never appreciated the value
of understatement. There were always Tirpitzes and Ludendorffs
at hand to exploit his megalomania. Thus, while it may not have
been impossible for him to deceive himself into believing that
the arbiter of war could be the guarantor of peace, he was all
the time playing into the hands of those in Germany who desired
war and ensued it, who were growing ever more impatient of postponement
as the strength of the socialist vote increased. He thus administered
a potent stimulant to a mentality, for the predisposition to which
others were responsible, which made it inevitable that Germany
would at last overstep the brink, on the edge of which the menacing
tramp of her efficient legions had long disturbed the quiet sleep
of her neighbours.

As regards his attitude towards our country and his relations
with its Royal House, he had a great veneration for Queen Victoria,
and respected her fifty years' experience of statecraft. But there
was little sympathy between uncle and nephew even before the accession
of King Edward. He had had ample opportunities to observe, and
seemed to appreciate characteristics then rarely displayed by
his own people, the impeccability of external appearance and the
quiet self-restraint, which are second nature to the Englishman,
trained to a certain uniformity of social standards and informed
by the spirit of his games. But he also shared with his countrymen
some scepticism as to the vital qualities of a race whose habits
of comfort, engendered by long prosperity, made them, in the eyes
of the new Germany, less fit to compete with the strenuous effort
and keen specialization of their rivals. In the years when I knew
him he seemed to be genuinely fond of our country, though in certain
respects critical, and by no means disposed to regard our institutions
as desirable for adoption in his own. For these reasons I can
believe that there was some truth in the explanation offered by
a German friend who knew him well, that the Emperor's earlier
occasional outbursts against Great Britain were due to dépit
amoureux.

But at the time of his accession a wave of ill-will towards
Great Britain was gathering strength in Germany, and though he
seems for a time to have resisted it, the failure of all his efforts
to lure us away from our detachment and to draw us into the Triple
Alliance, so as to enable him to control the European situation,
ended in his being also carried along with the stream. If, after
phases of exaggerated and, as it seemed, wilful misunderstanding,
he yet remained subject to occasional reactions, his personal
vanity chafed at his ill-success and resented any effort on his
part failing to secure immediate and cordial recognition. There
were moments when his hostility was deliberately accentuated in
a manner consistent with Bülow's admission [see page 134]
that the threat of war might be usefully employed to secure certain
ends, and would therefore continue to play an important part in
international affairs. The attitude, so aggressive as to become
actually menacing, which he adopted in regard to South Africa,
stereotyped the antagonism between Great Britain and Germany.
Subsequent disclosures have revealed that the famous Kruger telegram
was only an alternative adopted in order to restrain the Emperor
from taking much more drastic measures, which must almost inevitably
have led to a state of war with England. Correspondence which
has since come to light has amply confirmed the suspicion which
existed at the time that while the Emperor was writing the friendliest
letters to his relatives in England he was concurrently sounding
Russia and France as to the advantages of a combined attack on
Great Britain. His advances only met with a humiliating rebuff.
When later William II endeavoured in some measure to retrieve
the lost ground, his particular mental constitution no doubt enabled
him to believe that he had made the fullest amends. But by that
time the British people who, self-centred and slow to suspect
the motives of others, had taken many years to realize the progressive
hostility of the German nation, were not to be induced to modify
their judgment by a transient appearance of friendliness on the
part of a monarch in whose consistency they had no confidence.

It was this lack of consistency and his capacity for saying
and even for feeling one thing and doing another, which made the
ex-Emperor such an incalculable quantity. Perhaps no example can
better illustrate this want of consequence than the position which
he took up in regard to the Armenian massacres and their author.
The published records of the German Foreign Office show that at
the end of 1895 he expressed himself as ashamed of the callousness
of Europe, and he could find no word too strong to condemn so
"disgusting a personage" as the Sultan Abdul Hamid.
He could even agree that Lord Salisbury was not wrong in desiring
to make an end of the existing Government in Turkey. Almost simultaneously
he could affirm that the massacres, which he described as a matter
of indifference to Germany officially, were traceable to English
agitation. British interest in Armenia was merely a device for
involving Russia in a conflict with the Ottoman Empire and an
excuse for distracting attention from Egypt. And three years later
the sovereign who denounced the callousness of Europe was himself
paying a second personal visit to the disgusting personage at
Constantinople, and grasping his bloodstained hand in the interests
of German economic penetration into Turkey.

To myself as an observer, watching the scene from points of
vantage, it has always seemed that at a particular period a distinct
change took place in the Emperor himself. It began when the ungracious
and aggressive policy of Berlin had at last compelled Great Britain
to renounce isolation and to terminate the long period of tension
with France, to which Germany had not been alien, by a frank examination
and discussion of outstanding issues which resulted in friendly
agreement. Not long after this important modification in the European
equilibrium, followed by the revision of our relations with Russia,
the world was startled by certain deplorable revelations at Berlin,
which implicated some of the Emperor's intimate friends and necessitated
the rupture of his relations with a group whose reputation he
had been too naive and too little a man of the world to suspect.
Its most prominent members had for a number of years almost monopolized
his society and constituted themselves a kind of social camarilla
within the Court. The result was not only that he lost status
in his country, but that his faith in his own judgment was shaken.
About a year later followed the communication to the Daily
Telegraph published with his consent and encouragement, which
escaped the vigilance of the functionaries of State to whom it
had been submitted. It seemed to be in the nature of a last bid
for reconciliation with Great Britain, and its effect in Germany
was disastrous. From that period my diagnosis as an observer was
that his influence waned, and that his self-confidence failed
him. He was in the position of a man who has to retrieve the,
ground lost in his own country by an error of judgment and, if
indeed it could be regained, this would only be by marching with
or in advance of public opinion. In a country then still so traditionally
monarchical as Germany, there were individuals who criticized
the Chancellor's methods of dealing with Imperial indiscretions
and independence, and to the masses accustomed to salute authority
the Kaiser was still the Kaiser. But with the majority of those
whose opinion could influence events the man who had seemed to
other countries to control the machine of State had probably ceased
to count greatly as a personal force. The hands of the war party
were strengthened, and the Crown Prince took the opportunity to
assume publicly the traditional attitude of an heir apparent in
the House of Hohenzollern and identify himself with the more aggressive
manifestations of Junkerdom. The resignation of a chancellor,
who was never forgiven for having had to admonish his sovereign,
followed in due course. But the Emperor seems after this episode
to have played a less conspicuous part in public affairs.

That in the last years before its outbreak he regarded war
as inevitable, and made no secret of his opinion, is revealed
by two conversations which came to my knowledge. In June 1915,
I met, while dining with M. de Giers, the Russian banker Davidoff,
who came to Rome after a visit to England and France. He had been
many years an official and Kokovtseff's right-hand man, and was
spoken of as the future Minister of Finance. He told me that in
November 1913 he was in Berlin with Kokovtseff on their way back
from Paris to St. Petersburg. They were invited to lunch with
the Emperor, and Davidoff sat on his left. The abrupt question
was put to him : "Well, did you get your loan?" Davidoff
assented. They had been successful in obtaining what they needed.
"And now," said the Emperor, "you will build your
strategic railways." He replied that all railways were in
a sense strategic. In Russia communications were very deficient.
They intended laying a line to Bokhara, and that of course might
be described as strategic. "I mean," the Emperor insisted,
"railways directed against us---you are going to build railways
against Germany. That means Slavism against Germanism and inevitable
war." Davidoff protested: "Rather say Germanism against
Slavism, for nothing is further from our intentions than war."
"Oh," rejoined the Emperor, "if you mean by turning
it that way to question which will declare war on the other, that
is absolutely immaterial. How many Russians are there ?---one
hundred and sixty-seven millions ?---you grow so fast that Slavism
is a menace to Germany." All this was said in so loud a voice
that it could not fail to be heard by at least three people on
either side of the speaker. Davidoff said that such a war could
not be confined to Germany and Russia, but must become a world's
war which in the end would prove fatal to Germany. "That
may be," the Emperor answered, but it is inevitable."

The other and briefer conversation took place in 1913 during
a visit of the sovereign of one of the smaller European states
to Berlin. He was asked by the Emperor what his country would
do when the great war broke out. He replied that if such a war
broke out, his country, which was happily not involved in European
rivalries, would studiously maintain its neutrality. The Emperor
then said: "I do not mean to have any neutrals in the great
war, so you had better consider your position." These words
so impressed the sovereign in question that on his return to his
country he informed his Government of their substance. Steps were
taken not long afterwards by that Government unofficially and
indirectly to inquire at the German Foreign Office whether any
importance should be attached to them. The answer was that when
the great war came there could be no more frontiers in Europe.
This, however, would only apply to countries limitrophe with
Germany, such as Belgium, Holland, and perhaps Denmark.

The question of whether or not he "willed" the great
war will no doubt for long continue to be discussed. He has himself
strenuously repudiated the charge. My own belief is that after
1908 the controlling power had passed more and more into the hands
of the military and the head-quarters staff, whose recommendations
superseded the counsels of Chancellor or Foreign Minister. Thus
it was that although Kiderlin-Waechter, according to his published
correspondence, and after him Jagow, not to mention Bethmann-Hollweg,
were advocates of a better understanding with Great Britain, all
their efforts were neutralized. Once the military party dominated
a rather disconcerted Emperor they certainly would not hesitate
to bring on the conflict for which they had been preparing nearly
forty years, so soon as they believed the opportune moment had
arrived. Nevertheless, the ruler himself, if he had ceased to
be the really decisive factor, had played all his life too eagerly
with fire to be acquitted of responsibility for the conflagration.
[NOTE: Maximilian Harden, the strongest and boldest journalist
of the day in Germany, who had certainly no brief to shield the
Emperor, wrote in the Zukunft in November 1914: "Let
us drop our wretched attempts to excuse the action of Germany.
Not against our will and as a nation did we hurl ourselves into
the gigantic enterprise. We willed it; we had to will it.... The
object is to hoist the storm-flag of the Empire on the narrow
channel that opens and closes the way to the Atlantic." This
outburst fairly represents the prevailing spirit in the dominant
class, which the Emperor, even if he had desired to do so, would
have been powerless to exorcise.]

The realization that it was the unexpected entry of Great Britain
into the war which had baffled the far-reaching German design
of world dominion seems to have suggested to the inconsequent
mind of the Emperor in the last phase the hopeless expedient of
an eventual reconciliation with France with a view to concerted
action against the country which he held responsible for his failure.
The ex-Chancellor, Herr von Payer, in his volume, From Bethmann
to Ebert, has related that in 1917, while German resistance
and even aggressive power still appeared formidable, the Emperor
explained to a group of deputies the possible advantage of a compromise
peace. When the war was over he would come to terms with France
with a view to later on making war against ourselves. The disclosure
of von Payer, the accuracy of which there seems no reason to doubt,
has a curious parallel in the attitude of Napoleon III during
the war of 1870 when, as we know from the evidence of the Emperor
Frederick's diary, he proposed to Germany to make peace and combine
against Great Britain.[See Vol. 1, pp. 156-7].

I have endeavoured in this chapter to sum up the conclusions
formed from my observation and study of Germany over many years.
To resume, there were in the closing decade of the last century
two forces at work, both tending to bring about the alienation
of Great Britain. The Emperor and his Government, displaying little
scruple as to the means adopted, spared no effort to separate
Great Britain and France, and to drive the former into some binding
obligation towards the Triple Alliance by continually aggravating
our difficulties so long as we retained our full liberty of action.
Simultaneously a covetous envy of Great Britain's long-established
position in the world and a conviction that it was their destiny
to replace us took possession of the German people, and gave definite
direction to their activities. When, owing to maladroit and reckless
manoeuvres, the former plan not only miscarried but led to the
precisely opposite result, administrative Irritation and popular
sentiment joined forces and added momentum to the current of antagonism
to Great Britain.